


Touch

by backpackbagel



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Mentions of other characters - Freeform, Romance, Tony and Pepper are just friends, inside Tony's head, the team is fairly new
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-08-19
Packaged: 2018-04-07 19:35:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4275411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/backpackbagel/pseuds/backpackbagel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony Stark doesn't like to be touched.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Touch

Tony Stark doesn’t like to be touched. Okay, that’s not true. He does. But he has requirements, as any sane person would. One, he has to know the person. Two, he has to _like_ the person. And three, he has to actually _invite_ the person to touch him. There’s a pretty thin list of people who fit those requirements, in his opinion. Pepper is allowed. Rhodey is allowed. The _very_ carefully selected girls he sleeps with are allowed, but that’s really a one-night-only deal.

So, by most people, other than the list above, Tony Stark doesn’t like to be touched.

He doesn’t like to be handed things, he doesn’t like his personal space invaded, and most of all, he doesn’t like to be touched.

It isn’t like there’s some dramatic story behind it. There’s no particular causal event, nor a gradual development of these feelings over the years – not that he could recall, anyway. As long as he could remember, he just wanted people to stay a safe distance away.

And he’s not a wounded animal. Definitely not. He doesn’t want anyone to think that. He’s neither scared of casual touches, nor reacts violently towards them. He just doesn’t like them.

When he was growing up, people just didn’t... _touch_ him. His bodyguards didn’t play with him. His nannies and butlers stayed at arm’s length. Hell, his parents weren’t around often enough to give him hugs and shit like that.

Touch was and _is_ still foreign to him. And he doesn’t mean the sexual kind – he’s had plenty of that. It’s not the same as the kind of contact from someone who knows him. Or someone who cares.

Pepper is allowed to touch him, but he trusts her. He’s probably most comfortable with her. After all, she _did_ reach into his chest. Does that count as a touch? Probably. She’ll put watches on him, tie his ties when he’s being obstinate, and she’ll patch him up when he gets bumps and bruises. Her touches are soft and gentle. He can feel the care she puts into each one, but they’re also efficient and purposeful, and never linger longer than they need to. He danced with her once, and even then, it was professional. He wanted there to be something more in her touch that night, but there wasn’t. And that was okay. He still enjoyed her touches.

Rhodey is allowed to touch him, but he does so far less than Pepper. It was usually to usher Tony to somewhere he needed to be, or a friendly grabbing of the arm or shoulder to make a point. Less meaningful, but acceptable nonetheless. He and Rhodey connected, and even when they didn’t see eye to eye, he knew his best friend would always have his back. His touches aren’t gentle, but they are caring. He likes that about them.

Bruce is allowed to touch him, but he rarely does so. Like Tony, Bruce isn’t particularly touchy-feely, and often keeps his hands to himself. Tony doesn’t know his touch well enough to label it, but he likes Bruce on an intellectual level and he wants to learn more about him. He watches Bruce’s hands sometimes, when Bruce doesn’t notice. They seem gentle.

Touch is important to him. Hell if he’d ever admit it, but touch is important to him.

Steve Rogers is _not_ allowed to touch him.

“Just let me do it,” Steve orders, exasperated.

“How many times do I have to say no before you get it through that thick, brain-frozen skull of yours?” Tony responds, shrugging Steve away from him.

Sure, Tony and Steve get along. They can live with each other. They literally _do_ live with each other sometimes. He puts up with Steve’s morning person-ness, and Steve puts up with his tendency to accidentally set the fire alarms off at three in the morning. They’re friends. But that doesn’t mean Tony wants Steve touching him.

“You need help,” Steve states, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“I can handle it.”

“Clearly not. You look like a...” He trails off, and Tony can tell there’s something else he’s dying to say by the way his mouth twitches. Steve wants to laugh, but doesn’t.

Tony turns to face him and gives him the most unamused face he can muster. “Like a _what_?”

Steve’s face turns straight as a board. “Nothing,” he obviously lies.

“Spit it out, Rogers.”

He looks like he’s going to say something he’s going to regret, but he says it anyway. “A mountain man.”

Tony picks up the soap bottle from the bathroom counter and throws it at him.

Tony trusts Steve. There’s no doubt about it. He knows Steve will have his back, and he’s got Steve’s, for what it’s worth. In battle, they work like a well-oiled machine, and at home, they’re friends. Good friends, or something.

They fight. A lot. They’ll yell at each other, ignore each other, and even come to blows on occasion. But they’re hotheads. They both know that about each other. So when one of them finally comes to apologize, which always happens, the other always accepts because chances are whatever they were fighting about was stupid in the first place.

But they don’t always fight. Sometimes they get along marvelously. They have, surprisingly, the same taste in movies (because documentaries are fun, god damn it) and they can share a nice, comfortable silence without either man feeling the need to speak for hours upon hours.

They understand each other.

So, Tony can always trust Steve to be honest with him, and vice versa. Even if it sounds mean or cruel, if Steve says he looks like a mountain man, he probably does. Hell, he probably looks worse.

“I prefer the term ‘rustic,’” Tony corrects.

“Rustic, barbaric, whatever you want to call it, you need to shave,” Steve nags.

Tony looks in the mirror. He _is_ sporting a full-blown beard now. “It can wait until Pepper gets here.”

“Fine,” Steve shrugs. “But I’m not gonna be the one to defend you when Clint and Natasha start tearing into you for it.”

Tony sighs. Steve’s right. He can practically _hear_ all of the jabs and jokes coming. “I’ll do it myself,” he says, and picks up the knife. Steve grabs it right out of his hand. “That’s dangerous.”

“ _You’re_ dangerous!”

“To whom? I’m just trying to shave here!”

“You’re the one who insists on shaving with a knife! You can’t do it with your off hand!”

“Who says?”

“ _You_ , apparently, or you’d have done it days ago!”

Steve always reads him like a book.

Last week, Tony broke his better arm in a battle, and now he can’t shave. Not by himself, anyway, and certainly not with the straight razor he prefers to do it with. And there’s no way in hell he’s going to let anyone do it besides Pepper.

“Let me do it,” Steve repeats as if he’s reading Tony’s mind.

And even if he does let someone else do it, it won’t be Steve. Steve hasn’t made it onto his okay-to-touch list yet. It doesn’t matter why, and he doesn’t need a reason. He’s a grown man, and he can make decisions however he wants, reasoning unfounded or not.

“Are you even listening?” Steve questions.

“Thinking,” Tony states.

“About _what_?”

“What you’d look like with a beard.” He knows the non sequitur will piss Steve off. It does; he watches as Steve’s lips tighten and his brow furrows. Steve hates it when he avoids the subject at hand.

“Come _on_ , Tony—“

“I bet it’d be patchy—“

“Stop avoiding m—“

“Brown or blonde? I can’t really tell with you.”

Steve doesn’t respond. By now, after living together as long as they have, he’s learned how to deal with this. When Tony tries to change the subject, Steve will stop talking, wait, and stare him down.

It drivesTony _mad_ , especially because he hasn’t figured out a way to beat it yet.

He tries a desperate sexual remark. Fifty-fifty chance, he figures. “I bet it matches your hair down there.”

No response.

“What color is it?”

“Hm. Maybe it’s something really wild. Do you dye it?”

Not a word. Just piercing blue eyes.

“You don’t seem like the kind of guy who would shave it, so—“

“Let me do it,” Steve orders _again_.

He’s like a broken record sometimes. Tony bets he’s probably never even used a straight razor in his life—

“I used to use a razor like yours when I was in the army,” Steve argues in his defense.

Big whoop. Steve’s a big, burly guy. His hands are probably as precise as a jackhammer—

“I’ve got perfect control. I won’t cut you.”

Whatever. Chances of him getting Tony’s beard _just right_ were nil.

“I _can_ do it, Tony. I know exactly how you want it.”

Great. Now he’s a _fucking_ mind reader too.

Touch is important to Tony.

He doesn’t want to let Steve touch him. It isn’t because he doesn’t trust Steve, nor because he doesn’t like Steve. It’s simply because he’s afraid he’ll like this particular touch just a little too much.

“ _Please_ , Tony,” Steve asks.

Tony may or may not have a thing for Steve. He may or may not have a thing for his big blue eyes, that perfectly shaped ass, and those strong, steady hands. This ‘thing’ he has for Steve is just a phase, he tells himself. It’ll pass.

And that’s why he will _never, ever,_ in his whole entire lifetime, let Steve touch him.

“Fine,” he says, despite himself. “But just this once.”

_God damn it._

Tony Stark knows very well that he does _not_ have a will of steel. 


	2. Steve's Touch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony Stark doesn't like to be touched.  
> Chapter 2: Steve wildly swings a knife at Tony (or that's how Tony sees it, anyway).

 

There they sit, in two chairs facing one another. Steve has a rag, a bowl of water, the cream, and the knife, all placed carefully on a stool next to him. He dips the rag in the water and rings it out.

"Relax," Steve says. "You're tenser than Thor after he’s had a run in with his brother.”

“Funny,” Tony replies sarcastically, unamused.

Steve ignores him and takes hold of his jaw with one firm, moist hand, picking up the now damp rag in the other.

His touch is efficient. Purposeful. Not gentle, but not rough either. It's guarded, too. At this point, Tony knows he can't escape if he wants to, as Steve holds him firmly in place, slowly dragging the cloth along his face, moving from back to front methodically.

Tony can feel his fingers through the rag. Steve wipes his jaw again in one swipe, with one finger running along the cheek and another underneath the jaw, efficient enough to be sure not a spot is missed. It’s an oddly intimate-feeling touch given that there is a cloth barrier still between their skin.

"Why are you looking for an escape route?" Steve asks, causing Tony to look him straight in the eyes. He's close. And his eyes are very, very blue.

"Wasn't," Tony lies, covering up his lingering gaze by turning it into a challenging stare.

"Your eyes were darting from door to door," Steve accused, a tiny hint of a wry smile appearing on his face.

"Are you gonna stare at my eyes all day or do what you came here for?"

Steve smiles as if he finds that humorous.  Tony finds nothing at all about this situation humorous.

Steve puts down the rag and squirts shaving gel into his hands. Tony watches as he rubs them together, lathering the distinguished-smelling foam with a repeating, deliberate pattern. It's a sensible motion. And predictable. Tony likes that.

"Chin up," Steve orders, and Tony does so. Steve goes to work, covering every inch of his face with the cream, taking his time and making sure there isn't a bare spot in sight.

He rinses his hands in the water and as he dries them and picks up the blade, Tony warns, "Don't you fucking mess up my look."

"Close your mouth," Steve chuckles. "And your eyes, for God's sake. You're making me nervous."

"Oh, you're nervous?" Tony mocks. "It's my face at stake here. I gotta make sure you use the right side of the knife--"

Steve immediately searches through the foam, grabs a hair along Tony's jawline, and plucks it out.

Tony swipes at him, but Steve easily dodges. "What the hell, you ass—“

"I'm not sure why you're so determined to antagonize me while I'm doing you a favor," Steve says with an unimpressed eyebrow raised, "but if you're not careful, I'll pluck them all out one by one."

"That's fucking abuse," Tony mutters, annoyed with Steve now. This is a big step of trust for Tony, and he's never had anyone do that to him before. It almost felt like a betrayal, but at the same time... it wasn't so bad. He isn't sure how to feel, so he sets his mind back on the task at hand, closing his eyes and lifting his chin. "Just don't slit my throat," are the last words he allows.

It takes almost all of his willpower not to open his eyes and visually examine what Steve's up to, even though he can feel Steve's hand holding his throat steady. The cool knife presses down, and even though every consequent swipe is swift, painless, and purposeful, Tony is still incredibly nervous.

He isn’t sure how long he’s sitting there, but it feels like forever – like each shave is only minutely closer to the end. He begins to get antsy. Why is this taking so long? It’s a goatee, not a sculpture of David and Goliath. He shifts impatiently in his seat.

"Relax your muscles," Steve instructs quietly, though soft as his voice was, Tony felt breath on his neck. Breath. His heartbeat raises and he's pretty sure he's doing the opposite of what Steve wants, but he really can't help it. Steve is close, and now that Tony’s noticed it, he's over-aware of the distance between them, the warmth of Steve's breath, the closeness of their knees, the hand cupping his jawline so firmly, yet gracefully--

Steve yoinks another hair and Tony's eyes shoot open. He's face to face with his grinning enemy.

"There are a lot of words for people like you, Rogers, and I'm almost certain 'asshole' is at the top of the list." Tony moves his hand instinctively to the sore spot and he's met with... incredibly smooth skin. Well, what do you know, he thinks, this is a damn good shave. "Huh," is all he says.

"Did I get you anywhere?" Steve asks, examining Tony's face. "I don't see any blood," he adds, picking up the wet rag again and cleaning the remainder of shave foam from his face.

Tony picks up a mirror and examines his goatee. Fucking hell, Steve's _good_.

"Did I do okay?" Steve asks, and Tony delays his response intentionally.

He does his best to look unimpressed. "It works."

Steve smiles, "I guess that's the best thank you I'm going to get."

"You insisted on doing this. And you assaulted me twice--"

"Don't be dramatic," Steve laughs. Tony makes a face and stands up, grabbing the dry towel, but Steve stops him. "We're not finished yet. Sit back down."

Tony doesn't budge. His heart is almost beating out of his chest in happiness that it's finally over. "You did your job. I'm not letting you cut my hair too."

"Just trust me," Steve implores, eyes big and pleading. He motions to the seat and Tony very reluctantly takes it. "Close your eyes."

Tony shuts his eyes, wondering if he can be considered a masochist for sitting back down and willingly putting himself through so much stress.

Steve touches Tony’s neck, and Tony immediately jerks back. Without the beard hair and the shaving foam, he can really feel the light finger trace and it sends a shiver throughout his body.

Despite his eyes being closed, he can all but feel the smile curling onto Steve’s lips.

“Who knew?” Steve speaks up. “The invincible Iron Man has a ticklish neck.”

Shit. “Don’t even think about—“

“I won’t,” Steve chuckles, failing miserably at being assuring. “I promise. I’ll press down harder; it won’t tickle as much.” Tony hears his grin through the way he speaks, but doesn’t open his eyes.

“Go on,” he orders impatiently. “What are you waiting for?”

Steve puts his hands on Tony's face again, and without the beard hair and the shaving foam, he can really feel it. Steve's hands are smooth and slick now - he's spreading an oil-based lotion on Tony's face - and his touch has changed. Before it was firm and methodical. Now it's... It's full of meaning. It's massaging, and soothing, and almost caressing. Steve's putting care into this touch, and Tony can't figure out for the life of him what this means. He's never felt someone touch his face like this before.

"Keep your eyes closed, okay?" Steve asks, though Tony isn't sure why, because he hadn't had any intention of opening them before now. There’s a hint of nervousness in his voice that Tony can’t quite explain. "You always say you're not good at the mushy stuff, and trust me, I'm no expert either, but I..." Steve pauses and Tony can hear him exhale, and suddenly this is an intimate moment. Now Tony's heart's thumping again. He isn't sure what he's hoping Steve will say, but he's filled to the brim with anticipation. "Thanks for letting me do this, Tony,” Steve begins again, with care placed into every word. “It was obviously a big deal for you, letting me shave your face, and even though I'm not really sure why that is, it means a lot to me that you trusted me enough to let me do it." Steve removes his hands from Tony's face and Tony hears him dipping the rag in the water again. "Okay. All done." Tony opens his eyes and Steve's drying his hands.

That’s it?

As Steve gets up and empties the water bowl, Tony feels a little... disappointed, maybe? Is that it? He isn't sure what he wanted to hear from Steve, but that apparently wasn't it. He wants something more than that, he admits to himself a little ashamedly, and Steve just isn't on the same page.

That's okay, he thinks. It's fine, the way things are.

Or is it?

He bites his lip and looks to the door on the right. He could follow Steve into the bathroom and tell him. Just get it out there and be done with it. What happens, happens.

Or he could take the door on his left. Go downstairs and grab some grub, and parade his new, freshly shaven face around. He could just forget about this whole thing.

Tony has a decision to make. And he has no idea what to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's he gonna do? The anticipation is killing me.

**Author's Note:**

> Stay tuned for Chapter 2: 'The Shavening.'


End file.
